Andreas Eriksen
Andreas is currently setting up a shared service centre for two factories in Tianjin, China for Novo Nordisk. Even though he worked in other companies after his first contact with Novo Nordisk, like Bombardier and Venture Cup, Andreas returned to the company in 2012 where he remains until today.
He was one of the main figures of YEAD, being an active member for 8 years now. With a very high alumni spirit, he was one of the main figures behind the 6th Alumni Conference in 2009.
Boris Kolev
Experienced in Management and Marketing fields, this Bulgarian entrepreneur developed skills in the Information Technologies and Event Management spheres.
He is currently owner of JT International, a holding group with activities in Marketing Innovations, Corporate Communications and IT Solutions that counts now in the portfolio companies like Digimark, currently expanding its activities to other countries in Europe.
Brian Gjerstrup
Brian founded of several startups, among them StartupSteps, co-founded by another two Alumni Honoris. He was elected President of JA-YE Alumni Europe in 2008 and was chairman of YEAD, between 2005 and 2006.
Mainly interested in empowering entrepreneurs, Brian is what we can call an expert in the entrepreneurial ecosystem, keen on business networking. He is currently involved in some of the hottest startup environments in the Nordic Region like NEST Copenhagen and #CPHFTW.
Who are the Honoris?
Camilla Frost
Today, Camilla is a Consultant at the world's leading information technology research and advisory company, Gartner.
Having studied IT & Business at the IT University in Copenhagen, Camilla developed academic studies within the areas of Benefit Realization, Change Management, Resource Based-View and IT governance.
Julia Tollin
Julia became a Rethoric Specialist and currently owns a company on that field. Her work consists mainly in performing services within event managment, usually moderating panel discussions, conferences and bigg gala events.
She joined the European Board for a year in 2010. For a long time she worked at Junior Achievement's office in Sweden where she managed 24 regional offices for more than three years. Meanwhile she found time to be a board member in a big Swedish entrepreneurial network.
Dennis Gotta
Dennis is nowadays a Venture Manager at Siemens.
Back in the days, he was one of the founders of JENZ, German alumni network, Dennis was very active in the early stages of Alumni Europe, co-creating the Alumni Manual among other things.
Louise Edwards
Louise holds a master in Strategy, Organisation & Leadership from Aarhus University and is now a Project Manager in Siemens Wind Power.
She says she never passes up on an opportunity to challenge herself. In 2009 she joined the European Board, being elected President in 2010. Louise was a fundamental player in the development of the alumni network, having been the Editor-in-Chief of the Flying High from 2004 to 2009, responsible for creating, editing and distributing the European Newsletter.
Nerijus Malinauskas
Partner in several companies, some of them co-founded by him, Nerijus has been mostly interested in the development of mobile solutions and to start an international business in this field.
A very active member in the early stages of Alumni europe that has been of major importance in the early and fragile years of JA-YE Alumni Europe. Nerijus has also been very passionated about entrepreneurship and has worked for the European office of Junior Achievement as an Education Technology Consultant.
Mikko Jaatinen
Mikko is currently Partner at Nordic Business Forum (NBF) and works as a major player in Sales and in the customer service of this company. NBF is a business development company focusing on open business seminars, organizing and hosting some of the most significant open business seminars in Northern Europe, welcoming more than 6000 people in its major event.
With a history of entrepreneurship and leadership, among many businesses, Mikko owned a Café PicNic in Helsinki in 2009, moved to Australia, lived in the U.S.A. and had many adventures around the World, naturally becoming an expert in networking.
Nynne Christiansen
Today, among other things, Nynne is a teacher of entrepreneurship at the Technical University in Copenhagen and studying a master in leadership and innovation.
With a strong engagement in volunteer organisations within leadership, entrepreneurship and solidarity work, Nynne's interests are centered around entrepreneurhsip, organizational development, employee driven innovation, cross-cultural cooperation and knowledge-sharing. Nynne among other projects, was co-founder of Startup Steps with Brian and Jonas (both Honoris).
Ricardo Martins Costa
Ricardo is passionate about business and has been involved in the development of several business ideas for the past years.
His entrepreneurial spirit led him to become founding partner of turnU, a communication agency created to satisfy different needs of other companies with unique, innovative and distinctive solutions, developing the most effective communication aspects for each product - acting as a business tailor. Besides this, he is also working in an exciting startup called Emailbidding - the first and only Email Marketing Marketplace in the World.
Master in Services Engineering and Management, Ricardo was Vice-President of Alumni Europe for 4 years, beeing the main person behind several important projects such as The Alumni Leadership Award.
Tobias Dorpinghaus
Today, Tobias is a strategy analysist for Product Portfolio Projects and Car-HMI at Audi AG.
He has contributed to the beginning of the European Alumni network and has developed a important PR material for the organisation. With a long devotion to the Alumni Europe, he is an energetic and open minded innovative young person that has worked in some companies thoughout the years. He soon became Assistant at RWTH Aachen University and worked at Fraunhoffer.
Linda Sonnichsen
(Guest from the European Board)
Linda is currently the President of JA-YE Alumni Europe.
Davide Coppaloni
Davide was a very active alumni and one of the most enthusiastic members of the network. With a high commitment on the European level he was as well very important in the national level - founding and supporting the Italian network. For 7 years he as been collaborating as a facilitator and ambassador for JA Italy and JA Europe.
Back in 2010 he worked in JA Italy as a Marketing and Event assistant and has spent 4 years in the Board of Alumni Italy. Davide is a young dynamic, multi-lingual professional with a large international experience in the business, entrepreneurial and NGO field.
Davide is currently the Network Services Office at JA Europe.
Ian Bishop
Currently being the CEO and Founder of CoachSeek Ltd, Ian's entrepreneurial dream began in the Lightning Lab 2014, a business accelerator in Wellington, where him and his team successfully raised investment to drive the idea forward.
Ian was a very active member in the early stages of Alumni Europe and was the PR coordinator in the first European Board.
Passionate about sports, besides having been a tennis coach and a player, Ian became co-founder of CoachSeek. His experience led to an in-depth knowledge of the sports coaching industry in New Zeland and overseas.
Jonas Alexandersson
Currently founder and CEO of Usertribe, an online service that lets organisations and businesses optimize their online shops and services through easy video user testing directly from the homes of their target users. Usertribe currently offers optimization tests on web and mobile in 5 countries.
Jonas was one of the founders of YEAD and an entrepreneur from heart. His involvement in the national level made him a board member for three years and Vice President for one. Jonas soon started what would become an extensive list of companies. Among them MyCard that has won Denmark's Best Young Enterprise award in 2007 and was later sold in 2009. DanMag, eMOTOR, ViSamarbejder and Brugertest.nu are just a few examples of other companies founded by this young entrepreneur. Jonas was also co-Founder of Startup Steps with other two Honoris.
Katharina Krenn
Over the years, Katharina worked in companies such as Bwin or Michael Pachleitner Group. Today, Katharina is Marketing Communications Manager at Update Software AG, responsible for establishing new customer communication through campaign management. Besides this, Katharina is currently writing a book on Female Entrepreneurship supported by JA-YE Europe.
Katharina was an intern at JA Canada in 2006 before becoming President of JA-YE Alumni Europe.
Brynhild Vinskei
Brynhild has a broad experience and passion for communication. Specialized in topics such as lobbying, branding, PR Media handling, public affairs or crisis communication, this Norweegian alumni is currently CMO at Xstream, a pioneer company in OTT & TV Everywhere that delivers audio, video, and other media over the Internet since 1999.
Brynhild was one of the founders and the first President of JA-YE Alumni Europe, serving for two years. She founded the alumni network in Norway and worked at Junior Achievement's office in Oslo. Today she works as a Chief Marketing Officer and is married to another alumni (from Denmark).
Roxana Stefanescu
Roxana completed the Startup Programme in Romania, where she decided to start a thesis focused on Junior Achievement's work. Because of that work, Roxana started as a trainee at JA Europe in Brussels and later became a project coordinator. Very close to the Alumni Network, Roxana was the contact person between JA and JA Alumni Europe for some years.
Today, Roxana is a Senior Project Manager at JA Europe where she develops work on fundraising and organisational development, development of e-learning and e-mentoring educational platforms, among other things.
Sara Green Brodersen
Sara has worked for over two years in the UK and the US within marketing and project management. Over the years she has been involved with several youth organisations like Gate to Create and Ladies First, and was a writter/ blogger on Trend Online. Now, Sara is a Business Analyst at Implement Consulting Group. With a role within IT projects, Sara has primarily been contributing to decisions by analyzing business and IT data.
Sara was the Editor-in-Chief of Flying High newsletter for two years, one of them while she was also the Secretary in General for the European network. With a deep passion for the organisation, she has also caused an impact on the national level, being PR coordinator for the Danish Alumni.
Sten Saar
Sten was, until early 2011, Head of UK Sales and Marketing at Quickstart Global. Currently he is the Head of Operations at Onefinestay.
He is what we can call a "multi entrepreneur", being one of the nominees in 2007 as "Europe's Young Entrepreneur" by BusinessWeek. Together with Mikko, another Honoris, he was Founder (and CEO) of Realister, a company selling innovative notepads for students that has traded in four different countries, with a net revenue of one million dollars. This company was eventually sold in 2013.
Marius Klausen
Right now, Marius shares his time between his two companies: Moving Monday and AIRTAME. Moving Monday is a film and animation agency that develops visual communication for other companies. AIRTAME is an exciting startup that brings together several devices in one, making streaming possible from all devices.
Marius was an active alumni member in the Danish Board back in 2007. He remained giving an active contribute until 2011, meanwhile creating some companies along the way. Among them Bargruppen and later AIRTAME. Marius was co-founder of a leading high end mobile cocktail bar in Denmark with resources to serve cocktails for more than 500 people - Bargruppen.
Preslav Mitranov
Preslav is coordinating the pan-European Corporate Social Responsibility initiatives at Hyundai Motor Europe. As part of the HR Team he is responsible also for the internal communication and employee engagement.
Preslav was part of the European Board for three years acting as Vice President of the network. He was a very active member and responsible for many of the ideas we see implemented today. Besides his obvious passion for the network, he worked for some years at the JA-YE Europe office in Brussels.
Anna Maria Uhl
Anna Maria is currently Personal Aide to the Minister President at Staatsministerium Baden-Württemberg in Germany.
Anna Maria was one of the founders of JENZ, the German alumni network back in 2004. A very active voice in the early stages of Alumni europe, Anna Maria co-created, among other things, the Alumni Manual and was Secretary in General in the first board of Alumni Europe.
Elena Tosheva
Elena was Member of the European Board for 2 years and President for another 2. Her path on the European level caused a very strong positive impact on the network. Besides representing the Alumni for several years in a wide variety of events, she was in charge of several changes such as the implementation of new events, organisational changes and sustainable growth.
Elena has also been working closely with the JA office in Brussels where she is a full-time employee. Besides her deep involvement in the Alumni network, Elena was a Partner in some companies and in 2013 she became a Project Manager at Junior Achievement's European Headquarters in Brussels.
Christian Erfurt
CEO of the famous Be My Eyes app, he is a true entrepreneur with an out-of-the-ordinary story, who describes himself as a dreamer, a believer, a darer and a doer.
Christian began is career as one of the developers of EasySampler, a product later sold to a company in the medical devices area. He likes to help entrepreneurs to motivate others and is specialized in Business Development, Creative Problem Solving, Adaptability, Public Speaking, Organizational Structure and Motivation. Currently teaching classes of innovation and entrepreneurship at Aarhus Business College, Christian is also a motivational speaker on Entrepreneurship and Innovation. He is a regular speaker mainly in Denmark, but has also been performing around Europe and the USA.